I can't find an article confirming, but I seem to remember that Aldridge came out and said he wasn't interested in coming to Toronto, so drafting a 7 foot sharp-shooter with better athleticism than Dirk was the only choice to make. Even if LA hadn't made those comments, drafting Bargnani was the right pick at the time. Hindsight with drafting is too easy. Technically speaking, I'd argue that the player to draft from that class should have been Rajon Rondo, but I would have been laughed at if I had tried to argue him for the top pick back then.

You could also add Rudy Gay and Kyle Lowry to that discussion (and Brandon Roy if you don't count injuries). Either way, the Raps picked at the top of one of the weakest drafts ever. Can't knock them for taking one of the 5 (or 6 if you count Roy) best players in that draft. That is still a heck of a lot better than a lot of top picks. I'm sure there were people back then who wanted Adam Morrison taking #1, so at least BC got that one right.

Don't forget 2006 was that very same year Stern decided to stop High Schoolers (or kids 18 years of age) from jumping into the NBA. We would have likely picked, Greg Oden (who went to Ohio St.) or... *gulp* Kevin Durant... (who went to Texas A&M).

we had chris bosh as our pf why draft aldrige ???the only prob is thinking bargs was a center

Bosh is now a center the league is smaller the game has changed. Shaq said there are only 5 guys who play with their back to the basket any more. Lopez Bynum and a few others - he even said Dwight is power forward... its all about high screen and role.

Furthermore RULE#1 of draft - take the best player available (not by position).

1. Drafting Bargnani 1st overall in 2006. Nothing against European players. But drafting a Euro 1st overall is a huge risk. The guy that i was hoping they would take 1st overall was Rudy Gay. I'm still not sure how he fell to the Rockets at 8th because i watch alot of NCAA basketball, Rudy Gay was one of the most talented players in college basketball that time. And the Raptors that time had Bosh and Villanueva, so drafting another PF doesn't make sense.

2. Losing Bosh for nothing. Blame also goes to Bosh because i think he, LeBron and Wade planned to build a super team in Miami years before their contract expired.

3. Signing Landry Fields. Colangelo said after the season ended last year that he's going to upgrade the SF position. Landry Fields in my opinion is barely an upgrade over James Johnson. Heck, you can make an argument that Johnson had a better year last year than Fields.

As for the JO trade and the Turk signing. I thought it was a good move it just didn't work out. It happens. Turk had a great year for Orlando the previous year, can't really blame BC for overpaying. As for JO, not really sure what happened he just didn't work out here. And who knew Roy Hibbert would be this good. Hibbert was a stiff in college. I didn't know he's going to be this good.

Jermaine O'Neal missed 38, 31, 13 and 40 games respectively in the four seasons leading up to Colangelo trading for him, and his points per game went from 24.3 to 13.6 during that time. Even people with a passing interest in the NBA could see that his body was letting him down and his game was drastically declining. It was a terrible move.

I don't feel like re-hashing all of the bad moves that Colangelo has made during his tenure in Toronto. Let's just say that I didn't think he deserved the previous extension he got, and I don't think there's any way he should be able to continue as the GM of the Raptors.

Don't forget that JO's expiring contract gave the Heat the cap room to sign Bosh.

haha true, but I don't really read much into that. Even if the Heat hadn't made the JO trade with Toronto, they could have just let Marion expire and then packaged Banks with Beasley, since there likely would have been takers for Beasley back then. They would have cleared the necessary space one way or another...